Mona

Rooftop Rhythms, Abu Dhabi, 22 Nov. 2013, Night


In addition to this, I am also comfortable sharing the following item(s):

[X] The city of residence of the recipient of this letter/phone call
[X] The recorded audio of my 5 minutes of questions
[X] Incidental recorded audio (conversations had, questions asked, enthusiasm expressed outside of the official 5 minutes
[X] The transcribed text of my 5 minutes of questions





[…]

00:00:00-0

Yannick: What are you doing in Abu Dhabi?

Mona: I work in Mubadala.

Yannick: Mubadala?

Mona: Yeah in insurance.

Yannick: m

Mona: yeah.

Yannick: [to amani] Do you think she should be on that side, so I block the wind some?

Amani: I should be on this side. 00:00:14-2 we agree to switch places; do so; 00:00:27-3 )

Yannick: —Um, so who'd you write to?

Mona: I wrote to my best friend Ny (sp?) who lives in London, and .. yeah, she'd loved to have been here. That's why I thought of her as soon as you said, uh, "Write a letter to a friend."

Yannick: What did you need to tell her?

Mona: I just wanted to tell her that I wish she was here, because if we were in London we would have been going to Hip-Hop events together, and she would've loved to have been here.

Yannick: m. Uh, would you mind telling me a little bit about them?

Mona: About?

Yannick: Yeah.
00:00:52-7
Mona: Sorry?

Yannick: A-about her?

Mona: Oh, okay. Well, Ny is Jamaican. She's 23. She's really funky cool, she has a mohawk going on, piercings—you look at her from the outside you think "okay this is a wild girl" but she's actually really, um, I don't know how to describe her. Her work ethic is incredible, uh, she works as a writer. As a journalist. (tsk) And um she's just a really cool girl, she's always so—she's so chill, down to earth, she doesn't get mad. Ever, like I've never seen this girl mad. And—yeah, she's just, she's somebody when you—everybody thinks she's the complete opposite of what .. she actually is. Yeah.

Yannick: Why are you separated?

Mona: We are separated because I had—well basically I met Ny at university in London, and I had to come back here for work, and she stayed in London because she was born and raised there, so she had to stay there. And now I'm back here.
00:01:57-7
Yannick: Uh, and you said she's the first person who came to your mind.

Mona: Yeah.

Yannick: Do you think if you were at a different event it would have been different?

Mona: Uh yeah. . Yeah.

Yannick: Who else might you have chosen?

Mona: Uh—here? For like a hip-hop event?

Yannick: Or just, //to write to?//

Mona: //uh-um..// well my other best friend Lauren, who's Chinese and who lives in Hong Kong. Um, this event wouldn't be of her taste. At all (laughing). But uh, if I was somewhere else I would have wrote to Lauren. But I just thought of Ny as soon as I walked in.

Yannick: It seems like you have a lot of friends in a lot of places. How did you end up hopping around so much?
00:02:39-2
Mona: Well, because London is quite an international city as you know. So I had friends from all around Hong Kong, uh America, you know Jamaica, so .. it's-it's—it was a good thing, because now I have —if I want to travel anywhere—I know I might have a friend there, that I could stay with, you know, maybe show me around. But it's also sad that we're never actually gonna be in the same place again, unless I move back to London—or everybody moves back to London. So, yeah.
Yannick: So how do you stay in touch?

Mona: Facebook. Mainly. Skype. //Thank god for them.//

Yannick: //yeah, yeah// Is it enough?
00:03:19-6
Mona: (tsk) um ..—good question. Uh.. I wouldn't say it's enough, because it's very..—we don't really talk about the daily things we do, day to day, it's just when there's something important we need to tell each other, big piece of gossip, that's when we get in touch and be like, "okay, this is what happened." But, I don't know what they do .. day to day. So I guess in that sense it's enough.

Yannick: What do you feel when you miss someone or something?

Mona: When I miss them? What do I feel? I feel sad. Um, I just I feel .. like I reminisce. A lot. 'Cause we had—I was only in London for three years but I-I made such close friends and I .. I really miss them. Yeah.

Yannick: And is-is—what do you feel, physically? So say I'm a doctor and you're coming in saying "I'm experiencing this thing." How would you describe it?
00:04:16-2
Mona: (inhale) uh… I guess it would be pain in my heart but that's so cheesy, isn't it? I don't know. Um ..

Yannick: I mean if that's what it feels like/

Mona: /yeah. I-I wouldn't say it's that intense, but there's some moments where, I was like "wow. I wish my friends were here." If it's my birthday or something. Yeah. Yeah.

Yannick: And uh .. could you just tell us a little bit more about yourself, to sort of just wrap up?

Mona: Uh, wrap up? So I was—I'm Sudanese. I was born and raised here. I went to London for Uni. Um.. I have two brothers and one sister, I'm the youngest in the family. So .. I'm a little bit spoiled. I'm very stubborn (laugh). I fight for what I want. (inhale) Um, (tsk) No .. I think I'm-I'm pretty outgoing. I think I'm nice (laughing). Yeah, that's—I guess that's about it.
00:05:14-2
Yannick: Uh, so that's about it for the conversation, and you're right at 5 minutes. The project's about missing, […] And what it means that you thought of her here. And that sort of, is she here because you think of her? Or is she gone because you notice? You know what I mean?

Mona: Is she—sorry?

Yannick: It's this idea of like, is she here because you thought of her?

Mona: Oh

Yannick: Or is she gone because you noticed? You know what I mean?
00:06:01-4
Mona: (inhale) (exhales) I don't know, I—yeah. I-I see what you're getting at but I've never thought of that, honestly. Um, yeah.

Yannick: Did you.. uh, how long were you in the UK?

Mona: 3 years.

Yannick: 3 years.

Mona: Yeah

Yannick: Okay

Mona: 3 years but honestly, I felt like the friends I made in Uni, uh, they were my life-time friends. Like even though here I was in the same school for .. 18 years or what not—not 18—15 years, but I still feel like the friends I made there are closer. I guess because like, the friends that I made here, I made them when I was really young, so even though we all grew up and we have our own ideas we just stuck to the same group because that's just how we knew, you know? We just knew our little group. And when you go outside to Uni, you know who you are, and you choose your friends based on who you are, and that's why I think that even though I was there for 3 years my friends there are closer than the ones I had here. Yeah. [a man laughs] Yeah.
00:07:02-5
Yannick: Alright, thank you so much.

Mona: Thank you—this is a really cool project.

Yannick: And we'll get this sent right away.

Mona: Thank you!

[…]
00:07:12-1
Yannick: Perfect. Thank you so much.

Mona: Thank you. Good luck guys.

Yannick: Thanks

Mona: You're doing something really great.
00:07:22-9


END
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